Greetings from Boston, Massachusetts in the USA where I’m attending the “Business of Software Conference” and I’m having a great time with other software business owners, developers, coders, geeks… meaning - folks like myself :-)
Listening to speakers and getting inspired
There’s this amazing thing about listening to great similar-thinking guys doing geeky-software-stuff in their industries and learning from them.
I’ve listened to talks about disruption, creativity, A/B testing, mistakes, successes, pricing, social media… etc… and as I listen to each talk my mind keeps spinning and getting new ideas for the stuff I’d love to do, ideas I’d want to implement in my company and improvements I’d love to build into Nozbe…
Re-discovering ideas all over again
Most of the ideas I listen to on this conference I have heard before. But when I hear them again, with a new twist or a new example or a new use-case… new ideas jump in and finally things start making sense.
Later I get to exchange these ideas with other folks and talk about stuff… and it makes even more sense. Wow, I’ve got seriously so much stuff I want to do/improve right now in the way I’m doing business and software. My CTO should be scared :-)
Geeks are not introverts
Contrary to the popular opinion geeks are not as introverts as you’d think - especially for a person like me who works from home - I love to meet new people and exchange ideas. And I found out that people who attend such events are like this, too - we are here to meet and talk. Especially with think-a-likes it’s so great to have a chat and just walk over to someone and start a conversation.
One-track-conferences rock
I went to several conferences this year and I seriously prefer one-track conferences. When there are more tracks, more people wander around between these and many folks end up chatting on the corridor not deciding which room to visit. Not on “Business of Software” - over here there is only one track and it’s jammed packed as there is only the one place we can go to listen to the speakers. And later when there are breaks, we can discuss what we just heard with anyone… as everyone was there.
And my personal bonus - I got to meet Nozbe users :-)
There is nothing like talking to someone and when they ask what you do for a living someone else comes over and starts explaining what you do and why you do it and that they love your software. It happened to me today and I was blown away. Thanks Kevin for making my day and being a fantastic Nozbe evangelist!
Anyway, industry conferences are really cool on a personal level - I get inspired, I get to meet cool people in person - the ones I’d normally just read about somewhere on the Internet… and I get to get this additional kick in the butt to improve, advance and grow. What an experience!
Are you here on this conference? To which conferences do you go? Which would you recommend?